Water skiing at Club Med was highlighted in this 1950s’ poster.

DANNY GOCS

CLUB Med had its beginnings 60 years ago when Gerard Blitz, a Belgian-Jewish water-polo player, came up with the idea of providing Europeans with inexpensive, bohemian vacations in the Mediterranean sunshine.

Blitz proposed that guests would eat meals at tables of eight to break down social barriers, and everyone would be addressed by their first names.

Holiday-makers were expected to help staff with the cooking and washing up. There was no need for money as everything was included in the holiday price. The only additional expense was alcohol, which was paid for with beads bought on arrival and kept on a necklace.

But first Blitz needed tents and beds for the holiday site he had located at Alcudia, situated on a deserted beach on the Spanish island of Majorca. So he turned to Gilbert Trigano, a Jewish friend from his years in the French Resistance during World War II.

Trigano’s father had a business renting out used US army tents and camping equipment, and agreed to supply all the requirements for the holiday camp.

The “village” at Alcudia opened in June 1950 and, over the summer, 2300 people attended the camps – they were so popular that almost 10,000 potential guests were turned away.
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The winning photo in our holiday competition.

DANNY GOCS

A PHOTO of teenage girls silhouetted against the beach at Portsea during Bnei Akiva’s summer camp is the winning entry in The AJN’s annual holiday photo competition.

The photo was entered by Michelle Sobel of Caulfield, who was in the fortunate position of having two entries among this year’s finalists.

She wins a two-night stay at Hyatt Regency Coolum’s most luxurious accommodation, the Ambassador Club villa, which is situated in an exclusive corner of the spacious resort, complete with its own swimming pool, tennis courts and breakfast club.

“The Portsea photo had my daughter Taryn in it and the other entry was of my sister Yael (Rothschild) rugged up on the beach at Frankston,” she said.

Taryn, 17, is a Year 12 student at Mount Scopus Memorial College and took the photo while at the Zionist youth camp in December.
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Peppers Beach Club in Port Douglas

HERE’S a chance to win a holiday at the luxury Peppers Beach Club in Port Douglas by voting for your favourite photos from our finalists in our two great competitions — best holiday photo and best sunrise/sunset photo .

Click here to see all the finalists and to vote to be in the running for the prize. Voting closes on Friday, February 12, 2010, at noon.

Students from Melbourne on holiday in Thailand in January 2010.

DANNY GOCS

FOR the past 20 years, Thailand’s picture-postcard island of Koh Phangan has attracted tourists from around the world keen to enjoy the destination’s party atmosphere, especially around the full moon.

The resort’s population of about 12,000 swells to more than 30,000 during the high season’s full-moon parties.

The event last month coincided with New Year’s Eve and among the revellers were hundreds of Jewish holiday-makers. For most Australians, the party was a highlight of their three to four-week week holiday.

Among the partygoers was a group of 19-year-old students from Melbourne who were touring around Thailand for 24 days – Adam Trytell, Ashley Kalb, Brad Caplan, David Glass, Gavin Katz, Jason Samuel, Jesse Strauch, Joel Gocs, Josh Lerner, Noah Green, Ryan Lewy and David Wloszczowski.

They also visited Bangkok, Koh Samui, Krabi, Phuket and Phi Phi Island, but the full-moon party was the main reason they travelled to Thailand during the holiday period.
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Bustling Shanghai. Photo: Peter Kohn

PETER KOHN

SHANGHAI is the megalopolis of Asia, a city of some 17 million, brashly western and quintessentially Chinese at the same time. Its explosion as a hub of 21st-century global industry and commerce marks China’s spectacular comeback after the Cultural Revolution and decades of Marxist orthodoxy. China today is an economic superpower and Shanghai drives the turbines.

As the liner Giulio Cesare and its Viennese refugees -– my newlywed mother and father among them –- sailed from the Yangtze delta down the Huangpu River past the stately concourse of The Bund in September 1939, they would not have seen the modern glass and concrete towers of Pudong to the south, still decades away from being built.

Whatever odours may have risen from the river, my parents would not have tasted today’s air, thick with carbon monoxide and industrial waste.

All they knew about their exotic destination was that, as a British outpost wrested from China during the opium wars, Shanghai required no visa to enter. After the 1938 Evian Conference, when the world abandoned European Jewry, and visas were rarer than rubies, for those without, the city was just about the only place to flee the Nazis.
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ITAMAR EICHNER

MANY Israeli drivers are a danger on the road and don’t obey traffic laws, according to a US State Department warning to American tourists visiting Israel.

It also warns that aggressive driving is a serious problem among Israelis.

The State Department warning is contained in its updated guide on the State of Israel.

“The Israeli driver tends to make sudden stops in the middle of the street without any forewarning, particularly in the right-hand lane,” it says.

“Drivers must exercise significant caution on Israel’s roads, especially in light of the high number of traffic accidents that result in injury and the very congested streets, specifically in urban areas.”
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Queenstown, New Zealand. Photo: Ingrid Shakenovsky

DANNY GOCS

TAKING photos are part of the fun of holidays, so it is timely to offer a few tips on taking good travel photos.

And who better to ask for advice than some of the professional photographers whose work has appeared in The AJN over the years.

Edgar Asher is a photojournalist who founded the Isranet news agency in 1993 after making aliyah with his family from Britain in 1975.

His photos appear in newspapers and magazines around the world, including The AJN.

“Today’s digital cameras have opened up a new horizon to all amateur photographers. Although it’s possible to take hundreds of images without any extra cost, the best pictures are those that have been thought about before pressing the shutter,” he said.

“A photo of family members standing in front of a particular monument have their place, but usually lack imagination.”

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Jerusalem is the most popular Israeli city for tourists. Photo: AJN file

JERUSALEM – There were 2.7 million tourists to Israel during 2009, about 11 per cent less than the previous year.

Israeli Tourism Minister Stas Misezhnikov said that tourism from the United States was the primary source with 550,000 visitors amounting to 21 per cent of all visitors, an 11 per cent decrease from last year.

In second spot was Russia with 400,000 visitors amounting to 15 per cent of all tourists, with a 12 per cent increase compared to 2008.

It should be noted that 31 per cent of those visitors arrived for one-day visits.

French tourists came in third with 260,000 visitors followed by the UK with 170,000 travellers.

Ranked below them were tourists from Germany, Italy, Poland and the Ukraine.

Thirty-nine per cent of tourists were Jewish travellers and 54 per cent were Christian.
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New buildings clash with the old on Budapest’s Jewish quarter’s Kiraly Street. Photo: JTA

BEN HARRIS

BUDAPEST – On Kazinczy Street, in the heart of this city’s old Jewish quarter, a transformation is afoot.

Amid formerly residential buildings constructed in typical Budapest fashion -– several floors of apartments arranged around a rectangular open-air courtyard -– a growing number of trendy new establishments have sprung up, changing the historic neighbourhood into a lively urban enclave.

The courtyards are now covered, and the old residences are filled with contemporary art and a young clientele sipping cocktails and puffing on cigarettes.

“I never believed I would see this trend change and I would see young people coming back here,” Janos Ladanyi, an urban sociologist at Corvinus University in Budapest, said over dinner at Cafe Spinoza, one of the new restaurants.
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Pacific cruising on the Dawn Princess.

DANNY GOCS

IF you haven’t yet booked a holiday for summer, don’t panic. There are still good-value vacations available, according to leading travel agents.

Thailand holidays in December and January are still an affordable option with plenty of choices, says Roslyn Hakim, travel manager of World Travel Professionals in Double Bay, NSW.

This popular destination includes resorts in Phuket, Khao Lak on the Andaman coast and Chiang Mai in the north.

“Bali has a large choice of luxury villas for people wanting to holiday in five-star resorts.”

Hakim says the strength of the Australia dollar means that trips to the United States offer good value, especially on the west coast.
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